The Ravenna-Bryant Community Association’s Mobility Assessment Task Force will hold our final meeting on Wednesday, August 24 at 6:30 p.m. at Third Place. The meeting is open to all who live and work in Ravenna-Bryant who want to take action to improve pedestrian, bike, and motor vehicle safety in the community.
Concerns about driving, biking, and walking are commonly discussed during public meetings, private gatherings, and casual conversations with Ravenna-Bryant neighbors. To gain a better understanding about what the most pressing issues are, RBCA recently conducted an online survey asking neighbors to report concerns with getting around in the neighborhood.
The largest amount of comments were about pedestrian safety, followed by motor vehicle concerns and biking safety and infrastructure.
The most common complaint among all three mobility modes (walking, biking, driving) was people speeding in their cars along both arterial and residential streets. The second most common complaint was about how difficult it is to cross arterial roads and, interestingly enough, it wasn’t only pedestrians and bikers who identified this as a big problem. Motorists thought it was a problem, too.
NE 65th Street was the most commonly commented upon road.
- Multiple survey respondents said that crossing NE 65th Street throughout the Ravenna-Bryant neighborhood is dangerous. Several people pointed out that many Eckstein Middle School students need to cross the street to get to school every day and that it is common that motorists don’t stop for them.
- The other most common concern about NE 65th Street came from people who bike. They cited dangerous biking conditions between 15th Avenue NE and Roosevelt among their top concerns.
- Other concerns about NE 65th Street included cars driving too close to the sidewalk; crosswalk ramps pointing into traffic when they should be pointing toward the opposite corner; slow pedestrian signal changes; no left turn arrows at most intersections; and lack of clarity about the number of traffic lanes – is NE 65th Street 2 lanes, 3 lanes, or 4 lanes?
Other concerns that were mentioned by multiple people include:
- Difficult for motorists to see pedestrians on corners because cars are parked within 30 feet of the corner;
- Heavy traffic on 25th Avenue NE;
- Broken/uneven sidewalks;
- No sidewalks in the area north and east of University Village;
- No bike lanes on north-south arterial roads in Ravenna-Bryant;
- Motorists don’t yield to pedestrians in both marked and unmarked crosswalks on NE 55th and NE 75th Streets;
- No left turn arrow signals for motorists at most intersections of arterial roads.
All comments will be shared and reviewed during the August 24 task force meeting and an action plan will be completed. If you are interested in joining the meeting and committing to taking action to address mobility issues in Ravenna-Bryant, please leave a message on the Contact Us page or just show up!